Autonomous Delivery System
Rules and Regolation drones (netherlands)
package distribution and price classes
Introduction
The current delivery systems that are available in the Netherlands are failing to deliver. There are three reasons that show it has to be changed. First the delivery times are too long, people and small businesses rely to receive their packages as soon as possible. However, because of dense traffic and crowded streets the orders take too long. Also in the ever changing society of today people are not bound to one location anymore. The society is craving for a system that delivers their packages on-the-go. Finally the the companies only deliver in a given time frame, thus the costumer needs to stay home if he wants to receive the package. This even fails because of the systems that are used by the companies where emails and apps fail to deliver.
These reasons show that the delivery system is in need of innovation. This report will elaborate the options on how to do so. Then one of the options will be chosen after an elaborate research and carefully taking the user in consideration.
User needs
In the ever changing environment of today, the customer and small businesses rely on the postal service’s fast delivery traject. However the future will need a faster, more reliable and more user centered traject of postal delivery. Therefore we want to develop a system that brings postal packages faster to the customers and does this in a diverse way where it will even be possible to order AND receive packages on-the-go. Thus it will not only be faster and more reliable, it will bring the user(customer) back to the center again with a system that introduces a complete new approach to the world of postal service delivery.
Approach
One of the goals of our system is that it tackles problems with regard to urban and countryside delivery of packages. This could feature a two way system. For instance, when the package needs to go to an urban environment, it could be delivered using autonomous busses. The delivery to the countryside could be done using aerial vehicles such as drones, airplanes, balloons etc.
Therefore the project will focus and investigate multiple possibilities of postal delivery services and it will not just focus on, for example, drones because there are numerous possibilities regarding the approach of autonomous postal delivery services.
Further, it is important that there is a possibility to grow for this project. For example, when designing a system that could be used for urban environments. One of the solutions could be a massive tubing system. This could make the delivery of postal services fast. However the we want a system that is designed for the user and around the environment of the user. Thus the city should not be designed around the system, the system should be designed for the city. This is an important issue since one of the goals is to make a system that has the ability to grow. Therefore it is important that it is diverse and impliable in every environment so that it could be possible to grow from city scale to a world wide system.
Boundary conditions
Some important boundary conditions are: - safety - weather resistance - speed - diversity - sustainability
Ideas
The creation of a system with 'on-the-go' availability a system with a portable landing site could be used. To reach the customer when he is at the camping for instance, a portable landing site could be used for instance, such as the image below.
Options
There are a few options on how to design such a system. First, the system could go over land or by air. Both bring an their own drawbacks but also their benefits to the problem.
Pros
Diverse
As helicopters are not affected by the quality and/or presence of roads they can be used in both urban and rural areas, making them very diverse and suited for all kind of environments.
Delivery at door
Helicopter drones are typically relatively small and can take-off and land vertically in a small space. This means that they can land (almost) everywhere making delivery at your door possible. The helicopters have no fixed delivery start and end point locations.
Shortest routes
Because helicopters can fly they are not restricted to the infrastructure. This means that they can take the shortest routes to your home reducing travelling time and costs.
Small chance of being damaged
As helicopters fly high above everything and everyone there is little chance of getting damaged. Helicopters are thus a safe way to make sure your package gets to its destination undamaged.
Fast
As mentioned before the helicopters are high above everything. Because of this they can travel at high speeds without risk of collisions, making delivery times faster.
Cheap
After the first big investment of buying the drones the costs are relatively low because they run on electricity.
Cons
Weight of package
Because the drone needs to generate enough lift to lift the package the items can’t be very heavy or the drones need to be very large which takes away the advantage of door delivery.
Weatherproofness
A helicopter drone will typically be really lightweight. Because of this strong winds could cause the helicopter to swerve or crash. Other weather conditions like for instance rain could also cause the drone to crash as it limits the visibility of the sensors.
Restrictions
Nowadays there are a lot of restrictions on where drones are allowed to fly. This could make it hard for these vehicles to deliver packages everywhere. However, this problem could be solved by making new clear rules.
Small range
Currently drones have a small range due because flying uses a lot of battery power. This problem could be solved with better batteries.
Privacy issues
It is very likely that the helicopter drone will use some sort of camera to look where to land. When the drone flies over cities this camera can capture a lot of people giving rise to privacy issues. Also the use of GPS coordinates to locate where to deliver the packages can cause problems.
Failure can have large consequences
Because the drones fly at great heights with packages which can weigh up to a few kilos a failure could be a very dangerous situation. If such drone crashes onto someone this could cause great injury.